Trams don’t have to stick to a standard, please be unique and quirky

Article | Aoaohu

Only when it became clear what a "hunting outfit" is, another "hunting suit" appeared to give everyone extra lessons.

In the past six months or so, Ji Krypton 001 has proved that the hunting body, which was once quite unpopular, can also open up the mainstream market and create a hot model. The Denza N7, which was just released a few days ago, has classified itself into a fresher subcategory, "hunting SUV".

The essence is more important than the name

The so-called hunting SUV is of course a new concept developed by Denza itself. We who have seen too much car talk for a long time should not take it for granted. However, the so-called "hunting" this time is not based on groundless enhancement of value.

The N7 has a body shape that is significantly lower than that of a conventional SUV. This low profile is not caused by a coupe-style fastback roof - so it is not named "coupe SUV" alone. Not without reason. Denza is the sum of "hunting suit" and "coupe", creating a new term "hunting running" SUV.

There is no need to rush to criticize the old habits of the racing circle. In fact, for the more fundamental hardcore racing fans, Ji Krypton 001's "hunting suit" identity has also been controversial. There is even a chain of contempt among fundamentalist groups. Even if a car like the Mercedes-Benz CLS Shooting Brake has "hunting gear" in its name, there are still some European veterans who don't recognize it.

The origin and development of the Shooting Brake hunting vehicle is so defining. I have no intention of dropping my book bag here, and there is no need to drop the "hunting outfit" under this further integrated "hunting and running" concept. This book bag - that should be what Ji Krypton 001 was supposed to do when it first appeared.

What needs to be made clear is that in the new era, as defined by modern car companies, "what kind of new car can be called a hunting suit", a reasonable answer is: based on a coupe rather than an orthodox four-door A sports station wagon derived from a sedan that does not pursue maximizing cargo capacity. The E-class travel version can only be called a wagon, while the CLS travel version dares to call itself a shooting brake.

So there were doubts about Ji Krypton 001’s hunting suit identity. After all, Ji Krypton 001 did not have a four-door coupe prototype, and the 1560mm car height made it difficult to think of it as “travel-oriented”. "The final form will be a low coupe.

Then its identity as a hunting vehicle (rather than a station wagon) actually comes from a subjective definition to a greater extent. For example, if you think that the rear structure of the car is not based on maximizing cargo capacity, the side windows are low, and the rear windshield is tilted at a large angle to create a sense of sportiness, it can be classified as a hunting suit.

It must be noted that this subjective definition of "call it whatever I say" is not unique to domestic car companies and is not unique to this era.

The emergence of the Mercedes-Benz CLS in 2003 marked the birth of a four-door coupe, almost the first completely new body shape since modern times. It soon seemed like a tit-for-tat response. In 2007, BMW launched the X6 and created a new segment of coupe SUV/Coupe SUV.

Although the four-door coupe, both in name and in its corresponding car series, is close to existing in name only today, it has continued and influenced it for 20 years. Both types of body shapes can be called successful innovations, and those that are unsuccessful, some lack actual value and cannot continue to be popular, and more are "not that different" style of thinking they are different.

Choosing a name is very simple, a name is just a name. Under the new name, it is really a new form that is different enough to be able to branch out; the new form must have widespread needs in reality and be able to be popular (at least for a period of time) before it can have a place in history.

Please be unique, but don’t be weird

Whether it is the “hunting suit” of Ji Krypton 001 or the “hunting suit” of DENZA N7, they all reflect the new energy era’s requirements for the car body new requirements and new opportunities.

In fact, "Electrification makes the car structure more flexible" is an old topic. People have been discussing it for a long time. Without the huge limitations of internal combustion engines and mechanical transmissions, electric vehicles should be able to do all kinds of things.

But the reality is cruel. Almost all electric cars with unconventional proportions have no good results, and few of the best-selling electric cars look particularly revolutionary. The unique bow-shaped body of Mercedes-Benz EQS and EQE is in line with the structural change trend of expanding the long axis ratio and reducing wind resistance in the electric era, but it is not easy for ordinary consumers to accept it.

And those sales champions who seem to be closer to traditional aesthetics are actually not without compromises and entanglements in structure and function.

Electrification requires placing a battery pack under the car, which requires raising the roof or sacrificing internal space. This is a commonplace. For electric cars, the rear vertical space after the floor is raised will conflict with the roof downslope. In order to take care of both ends, many mid-sized cars, represented by the Tesla Model 3, choose to extend the C-pillar as far back as possible, forming an almost tailless coupe style.

Because the rear platform is too short, if the rear windshield normally extends close to the vertical plane of the rear, the remaining trunk opening area will be too small and the opening height will be too low. The Porsche Taycan is a ready-made example. The trunk opening is too small and not easy to access, which is extremely disproportionate to the large volume and depth.

Model 3 moves the lower edge of the rear windshield forward/up to expand the trunk opening; the same is true for Weilai ET5, except that black decoration is added to make the rear windshield look normal. At the same time, in order to increase the opening height and facilitate access to items, Model 3, ET5, Leapmo C01, and Nezha S all extend the trunk opening to the C-pillar, partially solving the opening height problem.

The actual boundary of the ET5 rear windshield, below which is the black high-gloss decoration

The last major remaining victim is that raising the lower edge of the rear windshield brings extremely bad, almost "super" Rear view of "running class". Streaming media rearview mirrors, reversing images, etc. may be able to make up for it to a certain extent, at least it can be solved by "adding money", which may be the final consideration for sacrificing this point.

A few models have tried to "dig holes" in the battery packs at the rear feet to solve the conflict between the rear heads and the roof curve of the car, but it is still difficult to widely implement them at this stage. Almost all electric cars face irreconcilable contradictions: ensuring rear space, too much C-pillar extension, too high rear end, and too heavy rear body.

The most direct way for electric cars to solve this problem is "I don't want to be a car." Therefore, the practice of directly converting the rear of the car into a hatchback and travel-oriented vehicle appeared. You will even find that if you cover the rear spoiler of JiKrypton 001, it actually looks like a four-door coupe with unnatural curves. This is probably the reason why JiKrypton is more willing to regain the concept of hunting suit.

The other way is to simply choose an SUV, but the cost and shape of a complete SUV (higher and larger) may not be what car companies want. Some kind of body style sandwiched between the two will inevitably appeared, so there was the so-called hunting SUV.

In fact, there are similar practices overseas. The Hyundai IONIQ 5 and Kia EV6, which are based on the E-GMP pure electric platform, have wheelbases of 3000mm and 2900mm respectively, but adopt an oversized hatchback shape of 4635mm. , only half a fist shorter than the "butt-y" Model 3.

One size larger than the Tucson, a hatchback

In the early days of the electrification era, the variety of possibilities that people imagined did not come smoothly, and they deviated too much from the original images of various types of cars. Transformative design is actually difficult to be accepted by consumers in a short period of time.

But body styles in the electric era are indeed quietly undergoing innovation and diversification in a more invisible way. People used to be accustomed to the three-dimensional world of cars, SUVs, and MPVs. Looking at it statically and generally speaking, it seems that it is not as earth-shaking as imagined, but looking at dynamics and details, it has embarked on an eclectic road.

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